4 Fast Years

This week was a significant week for me, I think. On Sunday (Father's Day) Ellie turned four. Now what is so significant of this birthday for me is . . . well, I've been married eight years. The first four of those years I struggled with infertility without Ellie, and the last four years I've had her by my side. Can I just say she makes a world of difference? She brings so much peace and healing to and aching heart and so much joy to this mom it is quite indescribable. So here is to the greatest day of my life, four years ago when I became a mother.
The cool thing about Sunday is that I got to put Ellie to bed around 9 pm, which is exactly when she was born out in Iowa (after 2 hours of pushing) four years ago. So instead of reading her a book, I told her the story of Baby Ellie again.

Below is her birthday cake, the best cake I've ever made in my life! My friend April bought a princess castle cake for her daughter's 5th birthday and I had asked if I could reuse the pieces the bakery used. It really did rock. Ellie loved it!
For some reason she was really very very silly that day. We had her cousins come over for dinner and cake and she is my crazy girl, I must say. We're just glad she saves the crazies for her family and those she loves because I don't think we could handle her being a class clown all her life!
Since she had a princess cake I asked her if she wanted to dress up like a princess. She said yes, we have a Rapunzel and Cinderella outfit . . . and she chose the Lilo dress. She's been on a Lilo kick lately, which I guess is better than most of the other princess movies . . . so there you go. Oh yeah, my dad's birthday is two days later so I made him cakeballs to say 56 and put candles in each one. We are cakeball fools.